Thanks very much for the response...I've read some of Smith's "Tales of Zothique" (he had such a flair for names, like Tolkien really) and loved them. It's criminal that you can't walk into a bookstore and buy a deluxe leather-bound edition of that stuff.

Breaking into early (pulp!) fantasy is like setting off an avalanche: a reader might start with Lovecraft, which leads to Dunsany, which leads to Machen, which leads to weird things like The Worm Ouroboros or The House on the Borderlands. That's what happened to me, anyway. So many of those books and authors are neglected or forgotten...but it's such a thrill to discover an 80-year-old story that can thrill, enchant, or terrify. Like finding buried treasure, in a way.

It's also interesting to me that authors like Tolkien didn't exactly exist in a vacuum...apart from his scholarly and linguistic influences, he admitting to "rather liking" Howard's Conan stories (in an interview with L. Sprague de Camp). There was a fantasy tradition that he was aware of, and familiar with to some degree. "They who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night." -- E.A. Poe